CGI simulation of tornado wrongly shared as cyclone Biparjoy

By: Uzma Afreen
June 15 2023

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Context

More than one lakh people are reported to have been evacuated from Gujarat in view of cyclone Biparjoy, which is inching closer to the western Indian state and is expected to make its landfall today evening. As Gujarat and southern Pakistan brace for the landfall, social media has been flooded with unrelated pictures and videos shared in connection with Biparjoy—which means "disaster" in Bengali. 

A video supposedly showing a waterspout over the sea is being attributed to Biparjoy on several online platforms. The video was shared by many users with the caption: “The dangerous encirclement of the storm coming towards #Gujarat Was caught on camera.” 

In Fact

The video is not related to cyclone Biparjoy and is an edited version of a video capturing tornado in Jersey, Channel Islands, from 2018. 

A reverse image search on one of the frames of the viral clip led us to an extended version of the video uploaded on the YouTube channel ‘orphicframer’ on December 22, 2018. The video is titled “Tornado in Jersey, Channel Islands (CGI simulation)(TikTok)”. The user has also mentioned the usage of the camera Nikon D7200 50mm 1.8 and the software Adobe After Effects and Cinema 4D (with TurbulenceFD plugin) in the description to create the intended effect.

Logically Facts reached out to visual effects artist Alexandru Dineci, who owns the YouTube account. Dineci clarified that the video was recorded in Jersey, Channel Islands, and had been edited. “It was recorded in Jersey, Channel Islands. And it’s obviously fake,” he said.

The video has been misattributed in several instances earlier. It was also linked to cyclone Yaas in Odisha and West Bengal, and hurricane Olaf in Mexico in 2021.

The Verdict

The clip is from a CGI simulation created by artist Alexandru Dineci. The video has been wrongly linked to cyclone Biparjoy.